Gardenia
by The Cheshire Cheese
Summary: Joel Cairo and Wilmer Cook have come too far to be ended by a snooping American detective. They end up finding an ally in Spade's secretary, Effie Perine. (Tags: Peter Lorre, Lee Patrick, Elisha Cook Jr., Humphrey Bogart.)
**A/N: This story takes place in the reality of the 1944 movie adaptation of "The Maltese Falcon." It works in a few elements from the novel, but ignores others.**

 **I don't own "The Maltese Falcon."**

* * *

Effie fumed in her office.

Earlier that day, Sam Spade had told her the result of his Maltese Falcon case. He'd sent that poor desperate woman, that knockout Brigid O'Shaughnessy, to the cooler.

"But she killed Miles Effie," Sam had said.

" _Don't touch me!_ " she'd snapped, recoiling from her old friend in disgust.

It was hard to say why exactly she was so angry. By all accounts, Sam had done the only thing a person could be expected to. Effie had even suspected after a while that O'Shaughnessy had killed either Thursby or Archer or both. But Sam's cold lack of compassion, it was the thing that upset her. It wasn't the fact he'd sent Brigid to prison, but the fact he hadn't hesitated. Effie had always liked to think her employer was only cold on the outside, that inside he had a heart. Apparently she was wrong.

And that implied all kinds of things.

She'd always thought that Sam's indifference to her independence and lack of "femininity," along with her other "peculiarities," was his subtle way of telling her that he accepted her, even respected her. She'd thought the same thing about the indifference he'd shown the flamboyantly queer Joel Cairo. She thought Spade was secretly one step ahead of society in compassion, just as he was in vigilance.

 _Turning the murderer into the police_ was _the moral thing to do, Effie_ , her reasonable side told her.

She responded to her logic as she often did in times of stress _: Can it!_

Sighing deeply she buttoned up her coat and left the office. Sam had taken the day off, leaving Effie to sort out the ugly paperwork. She'd had to go through the details of poor Brigid's arrest, and Spade's extensive notes on all of the thieves. All three men, Joel Cairo, Wilmer Cook, and Casper Gutman, were marked as homosexuals, a crime that itself could get one a few years of prison time these days. Too bad people like them hadn't been born a generation earlier. But those three were lucky they were being tried here, and not in Europe. She had a good bet why Joel Cairo had left whatever part of Eastern Europe he had, knowing the stories of what the Nazis were doing over there.

Effie was so deep in thought she didn't even remember leaving the office building, and suddenly found herself crossing the street in the feint drizzling rain. She momentarily lost herself in the light spray, and the colorful reflections glistening on the empty road.

A car suddenly tore in out of nowhere and screeched to a halt in front of her, making Effie yelp and leap back. The back door flew opened, and foolishly, Effie stood stunned, taking a few seconds to swallow her shock and watch what would happen next. What wound up happening was that a man seized her around the waist and pulled her into the car. This time, Effie didn't have time to scream. The car was screaming for her, tearing down the road with the door still opened. The man threw Effie across the back seat, and pressed a pistol under her chin.

"Don't move."

With his free hand he pulled the car door shut, keeping his gun trained on Effie.

Effie swallowed, fighting back tears. It seemed fairly obvious what was going to happen to her now.

"Keep yourself low Wilmer," a familiar silky voice suddenly emitted from the driver's seat. "Our faces are on every paper. Or will be shortly."

Effie's fear was instantly replaced by confusion. Turning to the front seat she asked, "Mr. _Cairo_?"

Joel Cairo's large baggy eyes met hers in the review mirror. She recognized the strong stench of Gardenia filling the car.

Effie looked again at the man holding her hostage, and let out a short laugh. "Well, at least I know I won't be ravished tonight."

The gunman stared down at her with wide unblinking eyes.

"You know us?" Cairo asked casually, squinting at the rode as he picked up speed.

"I remember you Joel Cairo." Effie glanced up at the young man leaning over her. "I'm guessing you're Wilmer Cook."

Not a muscle in Wilmer Cook's face moved. "Don't try my patience lady," he said in a slow flat voice. "I don't got the same weakness for women most men have."

"I know. Sam mentioned." Effie began to sit up, but a quick jab from Wilmer's gun told her he was serious, and she sank back down against the seat.

"You'll have to forgive my friend," Cairo said. "He's not the sociable sort."

"Yeah," Effie's voice was quiet now. "Sam mentioned that too." She folded her arms over her chest, and stared up at the ceiling of the speeding car. "So what do you want with _me_? You're thinking a mildly well-off detective's secretary will make a nice ransom, or you need a hostage for some kind of escape plan, or you just thought you'd try something new?"

"Eh something between the first two," Cairo said. "You see my friend and I, we don't wish to go to prison. And it would be immensely helpful if your friend Mr. Spade would make a few alterations in his report in order to make that possible."

"And you think that after Spade makes these changes and I'm set free, he's _not_ gonna go straight to the coppers and tell them what really happened?"

"What should it matter to us? We plan to be halfway across the globe by then."

Effie nodded. "Right," she said to herself. "And you think Sam Spade'll do that, just because you say you'll shoot his secretary if he don't."

Wilmer said quietly, "Spade knows I killed Captain Jacobi."

"And _we_ know he has a soft spot for women," Cairo added.

"That's where you're wrong Cairo," Effie said. "Spade sent Miss O'Shaughnessy to the clink, right after you and the Fat Man left the apartment."

Cairo's face changed, and his heavy eyelids flared.

"Sam's not the softie you or me or Brigid or anyone took him to be," Effie said bitterly.

"He won't let an innocent girl die," Cairo said with determination.

"He didn't seem too cut up when his own partner died," Effie said, remembering how Sam had almost with a laugh ordered his partner's name erased from his window. How he'd spoken of his partner so soon after he'd died. Even after the man was dead, Spade still loved to chastise Miles Archer for chasing skirts, while he himself had been playing patty cake with Archer's wife, and who knew how many other women. Where the hell Spade got off, Effie never knew.

"What were you gonna use that Falcon for anyway?" Effie said.

"We had hoped to get rich with it."

"And then what?"

"And live our lives as we please. Unbothered, un-hunted."

Effie laughed. "You think living as thieves and murders will be a peaceful life?"

"We're already criminals where we come from anyway." His voice hardened. "What do you know about it anyway, you have no idea what it's like to be like us."

Effie frowned at Cairo. "Maybe I do."

Both men did a double take.

Quietly Cairo asked her, "You're queer?"

"I like a bit of peanut-butter _and_ jelly. It's rotten the way they treat us. But I never saw how killing and stealing would make things any easier."

"You like your 'peanut-butter and jelly' here in America, where at worst you'd spend a few years in jail. Do you know where we come from? Do you know what's going on in Europe?"

Quietly she said, "As a matter of fact I do. It's part of why I was pressing for Sam to show a bit of compassion, with the whole lot of you. I don't know quite how you," she nodded to Wilmer, "or Miss O'Shaughnessy wound up in Europe as you both sound pretty American to me, but however you got there I figure any sane person'd want to get out."

"Wilmer's from America," Cairo said. "His story is long, and not particularly pleasant. Mine isn't either come to think of it."

Effie fought against her rising sympathy for the couple. "You're criminals, you'd say anything."

"And _do_ anything," Wilmer warned, pressing the gun against her skin once again. "So shut your yapping and sit still."

Rain pounded against the windows. Even lying down, Effie was able to recognize enough buildings to realize where they were going.

"You're taking us to the Bridge," she realized.

"Only for safe keeping," Cairo replied. "Spade is to meet us at a pay phone where he'll make reports of our innocence to the police. After we're convinced the police are no longer after us we'll turn you over to him, and be on our way."

"And it'll be that easy. Suppose I have to use the john while we're waiting?"

"You'll do your business without one, like your pioneer women!" Cairo laughed.

Effie found herself laughing back, before catching herself.

These men were scum, truly, but she didn't want anything bad happening to them, any more than Miss O'Shaughnessy. Her sympathy momentarily vanished when they stopped in the middle of the bridge, and Wilmer forced her out of the car, pinning her arms behind her. She wondered where exactly on the bridge they were going to keep her, then realized Wilmer was dragging her towards one of the bridge's construction hatches. Wilmer and Cairo had somehow acquired a key to the bridge's off-limit construction areas. The pair being experienced jewel thieves, this was no surprise to Effie.

Wilmer pulled Effie into the dark, while Cairo stood in the doorway, silhouetted against the city lights and the river. "You guard her Wilmer. I'll park the car and make a phone call to Mr. Spade."

"Hurry back," Wilmer said.

The space Effie and Wilmer were squashed into together was tight and narrow. Effie could feel herself being pressed against a thin cold metal ladder.

"This is a ladder well," she observed.

Obviously, she realized. She could almost hear Spade sarcastically laughing at her, _You'll make detective in no time Angel!_

"Hold still," Wilmer said, "And remember this gun is trained on your head."

"I can feel it," she sighed, as he pressed the cold barrel against her forehead, and tried not to think about how easy it would be for his finger to slip across the trigger just on accident.

She gasped as he yanked at something on her waist. He pulled the belt of her coat out, and used it to tie her wrists behind her, to one of the ladder rungs. Upon securing her, he brought the gun back up to her head, and they waited.

"So how long we gonna sit in this silence?" Effie finally dared.

"I got nothing against silence."

"Well for god's sake _somebody's_ got to break the ice. I suppose it'll have to be me. Though I doubt my story's anywhere near as interesting as you and Joel's. How'd an American end up working with a—what's Joel's actual nationality again? He had a dozen false passports, Sam said, but—"

"Lady, you got two minutes to quit your yapping before I get jumpy with this trigger."

"And how would Joel like that? Come in here, find my brains splattered all over you and this ladder well. And right when you two were so close to escaping." Off-handedly she asked, "Where do you think you'll go?"'

Realizing her detective work wasn't getting her anywhere, she sighed. "Alright we'll talk about something else. I'll bet you're into cowboy pictures Wilmer. You listen to a lot of 'Lone Ranger?'"

"Did when I was younger."

She shrugged. "Never could get much into Westerns myself. I always preferred the more fantastical pictures like 'Wizard of Oz' and 'Snow White.' There was a science fiction one I saw with my father as a child, a silent film from Germany. 'Metropolis.' It was all about a ruling class living in a shining city, held up by workers who were essentially invisible slaves. Sometimes that's how I feel, as a woman, as a—what's the scientific word for it—bisexual? I don't mean hermaphrodite, I mean—well you know what I mean."

"You don't know anything about misery, not out here," Wilmer said quietly. "Anyway you women can hide it. No one bats an eye and two female friends holding hands or kissing on the cheek. Try living in an asylum for a few years, or see if you can survive a concentration camp—"

"Aaaah," Effie realized, "So, you escaped an asylum in America and went to Europe. Then you probably sought employment with the Fat Man, because where else could you go. And there you met Joel, who was likely in the same boat, having escaped the Nazis."

"Keep sticking your nose where it don't belong Sister, you'll get a pound of led in your head."

"All those years locked up and kept on a leash by the Fat Man's stunted your maturity growth hasn't it. Well maybe after you and Joel escape he can…help you catch up to your age."

"I was older at age six than you'll be at sixty!" Wilmer snapped back. "You don't—"

They both jumped when the heavy door creaked opened.

Joel Cairo stood before them, with a grim look on his face.

"Joel?" for the first time since she'd met Wilmer, Effie was hearing emotion in his voice.

Cairo glanced to the side, as a massive shadow fell over him. The Fat Man appeared in the doorway, with a pistol trained on Cairo, grinning smugly at Effie and Wilmer.

"So Wilmer," Gutman growled, "You and Cairo thought you'd steal my car and I wouldn't be able to track you. I've come to reclaim what's mine; my money, my automobile, and my 'gunsel,' as Mr. Spade so eloquently put it."

Effie recoiled in disgust at the realization of what the old pervert had been doing to the poor confused young boy. No wonder Wilmer was such a mess.

"And what's this?" the Fat Man reached inside the tight ladder well and pulled a heavy lever. Lights flared on.

"I knew this place had to have a light switch," Effie said, more to herself than anyone else.

"I recognize you," Gutman laughed. "You're Mr. Spade's secretary, the one who delivered us the false Bird. Perhaps you can tell us where the real one is being hidden."

"And why on Earth would I know that?" Effie sighed.

"Come come Miss. You don't expect me to believe that little 'mix-up' with the Bird was an accident on yours and Mr. Spade's part."

"It was the Russian who made the false," Cairo reminded him. "The real Bird is all the way back in Europe."

"A conclusion I drew all too hastily," Gutman's eyes were now wide and serious. "Spade played us all like a fiddle. Now I want to know where the Bird is, or I'll begin breaking fingers. If you want the police to know precisely where you are, then by all means shoot me," the Fat Man taunted as Wilmer turned his gun towards him. "I have means of escaping this city before any police can catch up to me. But I doubt you and Cairo do."

Wilmer slammed his pistol into the Fat Man's forehead, and Cairo quickly dashed for the gun in Gutman's hand.

Effie, who had undone her bindings long before the Fat Man and Cairo had even arrived, brought her belt around and swung its buckle into Gutman's face. Roaring through her teeth she kicked and punched him a few more times until he went down groaning.

"Go up!" she yelled Cairo and Wilmer. "Go up, it's your only chance!"

They made the split-second decision to trust her, and went up the ladder, Wilmer first, followed by Cairo, then Effie. She gasped as a pudgy hand clasped over her ankle. She kicked at the Fat Man's face, finally worming out of her shoe, and continuing up the tiny ladder. The Fat Man determinately began climbing up after them, his face mad and determined. But after only a few rungs he stopped head, and his eyes bulged in disbelief and fury. As Effie had predicted, he couldn't fit up the well.

As Gutman's threats and curse words echoing up the tower, Cairo let out a raspy giggle. " _Brilliantly_ planned Miss—what's your name?"

"Perine. Effie Perine."

The trio continued onward until they reached an opening at the top one of the segments in the bridge's towers. The view of San Francisco was as breathtaking in its beauty as its terror. Effie had never particularly been afraid of heights, but being this high up made her almost physically nauseated.

"I can see my house from here," Effie observed. Turning back to Cairo she asked, "Did you ever make that phone call to Sam?"

"No, the Fat Man caught me before I reached the telephone booth. But there's still the letter I slipped under his door before Wilmer and I kidnapped you."

"Then I'll have to call him as soon as possible to tell him I'm alright. With Sam out looking for me that'll make hiding you two all the more difficult."

Cairo and Wilmer stared at her.

"Well Mom doesn't know much about our case," Effie went on. "But she does know I keep some unusual friends sometimes. I'll tell here I'm putting you two up for the night because you're witnesses under me and Sam's protection. You two'll be gone by tomorrow morning."

Cairo made a face. "You're certainly more willing to trust us now then you were before when we had a gun pointed to your head."

"Down there," Effie nodded down the well, "You needed to get away from the Fat Man and you couldn't use your guns, as he said. So why not just let him torture me and dash off while he's distracted?"

Silence.

"Uh-huh. You may be thieves, and even murderers when it's planned out, but at least you're not cold-blooded killers. Now the way I figure it, if you don't change your ways after I turn you lose, you'll just get yourselves caught all over again, and I can at least say I've tried. Now," she looked around the daunting scene. "How the hell do we get down from this bridge without coming the way we came?"

"Eh don't worry about that Madame," Cairo assured her. "Wilmer and I are professional burglars and escape artists. Aren't we Wilmer."

For the first time, Effie saw the corner of Wilmer's mouth turn up, almost in a smile.

* * *

Effie was washing the breakfast dishes when the doorbell rang.

Cairo and Wilmer were long gone, having departed before sunrise. Effie had called Sam the previous night to tell him she was alright, and told her elderly mother that Cairo and Wilmer were witnesses for her and Sam's current case. Her mom hadn't believed it for a moment, and muttered something like "your decadent friends can sleep it off here whenever they like, just as long as they're gone before the neighbors wake up." Cairo and Wilmer were all to glad to oblige.

For disguises, Effie gave Cairo and Wilmer some of her father's old clothes that she and Mom hadn't gotten around to selling yet. As an extra measure, Effie had insisted on trimming off Cairo's curls, much to his chagrin. Mom had scolded Effie about the noise when Cairo's raspy protests became too loud, as Wilmer held him down into a chair so Effie could sheer off his premed locks. They couple left by train the next day, and so far Effie had heard nothing about their capture on the news.

Effie quickly finished drying her dish and went to answer the door, striding passed her mother was on the sofa listening to the morning news on the radio. Effie was not at all surprised to see Sam Spade standing before her. She was a bit taken aback by the genuine concern on Sam's face.

"Hello Effie," her employer said carefully. "I'm just stopping by to make sure you're alright, like I said I would."

Effie nodded. "It's very kind of you Sam. But I'm fine. I think that whole Bird adventure's finally behind us. I'm sorry I was so cross with you about the O'Shaughnessy woman. You did the right thing."

"I didn't want to," he admitted. "It's still tearing me up inside. But I had to. She was counting on my uh, 'compassion.'"

Effie swallowed, and wondered for the first time since last night if she'd done the right thing by helping Cairo and Wilmer escape.

"Would you like to come in, have a cup of coffee?"

"Sure."

They chatted and reminisced about the wild adventure over a steaming Columbian blend, and Effie provided a more detailed version of the lie she'd told Sam over the phone twelve hours earlier.

"…the last I saw of them they were all three of them in a brawl. I think I saw Cairo squished under the Fat Man, poor little guy. You know Joel Cairo's lucky he never went into orbit around that Gutman."

"So," Spade nodded, "I need to get this straight for my report. Cairo and the Gunsel kidnapped you thinking they'd persuade me into helping them evade the law. Then Gutman showed up wanting his Gunsel back, and thinking we still had the real Falcon. He tried to break your fingers in the dark but somehow got Wilmer's instead so the kid shot at him, only to find he was out of bullets."'

"That's how it was," she nodded. "Absurd as it sounds."

"And then they all began brawling, giving you a chance to escape." He finished off his coffee. "Well I guess a story that absurd's gotta be true. I'm sure if you were lying for some reason or another you'd come up with something more sensible. You looked like you felt distinctly like an idiot repeating that story to me twice."

Effie's gut tightened. She had lied to Sam plenty of mornings over coffee as they sifted through files, usually about what she'd been doing with her female "friends" the night before. Sam had never once been fooled, but he'd also never once unmasked her.

"Well," Sam pushed himself up from his chair, "I should 'outta get back to the office, those two cops will probably want to stop by and pester me again."

"Have a good day Sam," Effie said. "Stay out of trouble."

"You two Sister," he said, throwing on his coat. "Oh and uh, you might wanna open a few windows around here, let the fresh air in." He shook out his coat before tying it shut. "It _reeks_ like Gardenia in here." He gave her a long look, before placing his fedora back on his head and heading out the door.


End file.
